Not quite

This photo sort of sums up the past few weeks or month or however long it’s been since I updated my blog. The photo I had in my head when I saw this scene was way cooler, trust me.

See the little hole near her head (it was a hole in the weird cloth-type stuff they use to surround tennis courts)? And that perfect splash of sunshine? Ya, she’s supposed to be right smack-dab in the center of that hole with a nice yellow glow from the sun. She’s also supposed to have the racket up near her head with a great action expression on her face. The ball would ideally be closer too. I sat outside that fence for probably a half an hour, waiting for her to 1) run near the hole 2) have the ball close enough to her 3) get my focus right 4) get the right action. It never happened. The reason I gave up on it was the sudden realization of how incredibly creepy I looked. There I was, standing on the outside of a high school girls tennis court, shooting through this tiny hole with a giant lens. Several people gave me puzzled looks. Another man walked up to me to ask why I wasn’t just inside the fence, and stared at me in absolute confusion when I tried to describe what I was trying to capture.

And that’s why this photo sums up the past month. I’ve been trying to go to assignments and get the photo that I have in my head when I see a nice scene—that perfect moment with everything in its place inside that pesky rectangle.

Now that I’ve been at the Press Gazette over a year, I know what I need to get for each assignment for the photo be good enough. Sometimes, that’s all I can possibly get. Other times, with just slightly more effort I get something a little better, or something close to getting that moment I want all in one frame.

Here are some more photos that I’m almost happy with, but not quite.